Trying To Figure Out Who Will Manage XL Center

November 16, 2012|Jeff Jacobs

As a sports story, this isn't as sexy as Howard Baldwin's loud, failed notion that if you give him a remodeled XL Center, he'll bring you the NHL. Nor is it nearly as blah as management behemoths bidding against each other for the right to turn the lights on and off at the state's largest sporting arena.

When the Hartford Business Journal first reported that five companies had submitted letters of interest to the Capital Region Development Authority to take over management of the XL Center and Rentschler Field in 2013, two matters jumped out.

One was that the CRDA request for proposals asked potential bidders to submit plans for renovation and potential privatization of the XL Center. The second were the names of the half-dozen area businessmen, including parking baron Alan Lazowski, who have joined forces with Bushnell Management Services for their bid.

Maybe the big answers will come in the short term. Maybe they'll come in the long term. Either way, clearly, everything is now in play.

At this point, you need an MBA from the Wharton School just to figure out how the XL Center and Rentschler are run. The city of Hartford owns the arena, leases it to Connecticut Innovations, a new quasi-public state agency, which then leases it to AEG Management CT. AEG also ran the state-owned Rent until the state reopened the bidding process and turned management over to The Bushnell in 2011.

The decision to have one company manage both venues — to maximize events and profits — is not only wise, it is necessary. Yet it's only the start.

The deadline for the RFP is Dec. 17, and there is going to be a fairly entertaining battle until the CRDA makes its final decision in January. You not only have AEG and Bushnell. There's Global Spectrum, which operates the MassMutual Center in Springfield; Harbor Yard Sports & Entertainment Group, which manages Webster Bank Arena in Bridgeport; and SMG.

Folks, you'd better be hearing and reading about financial helmets crashing and managerial sticks being raised over the Rent and XL Center. If you don't, it'll mean too much of this process for control of public venues is going on behind closed doors. It'll mean that we're not doing a good enough job of presenting all the possibilities for the state's two premier sports venues.

The XL Center, pushing 40, needs to be renovated. And that's what makes the Bushnell's joint bid with a group called the Capital Region Sports and Entertainment Group so fascinating. Bob Crawford, the former Whalers player who briefly served in 2010 as president of Baldwin's Whalers Sports & Entertainment, is on the list. So is former UConn interim athletic director Paul Pendergast, whose contract was not renewed at Storrs and has become chief development officer for Back9Network and vice president of institutional advancement for the Connecticut Public Broadcasting Network.

Those are names familiar to sports fans. Yet it's the other men, Lazowski of LAZ Parking; James Carter, Carter Realty owner and formerly of the Phoenix; Eric Zachs, managing partner at Bantry Bay Ventures; and Peter Stevens, president of JCJ Architecture, who bring the financial and infrastructural clout.

"These are Hartford guys," Crawford said. "If there's one common theme from all the guys in the room, it's they want to see Hartford succeed, and they're willing to put their efforts and finances behind it. They want to revitalize downtown. They have businesses downtown. They want to see activity."

"This is a diverse group. Everybody has their specialty. I'm a very, very small part. They're all UConn guys, big UConn boosters. I'm probably the newest guy and I'll be here 30 years next October."

LAZ has long been rumored to have some interest in buying the XL Center. Once upon a time, it was a quaint area parking company. Now, LAZ is a major national concern. Paul Marte, communications manager at The Bushnell, said that meetings started about a year ago with the group. There was no formal partnership, and the relationship grew "organically" through talks involving the iQuilt project and other downtown and state venues.

"If this was a short-term management deal, The Bushnell wouldn't need any of us," Crawford said. "It's bigger than that."

"Obviously, it has become more serious in the past six months. These guys understand the issues and economics. They have a vested interesting in making it succeed."